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Youth fitness report card: It's as bad as you think it is

Cam Jordan exercises with kids

New Orleans Saints defensive end Cameron Jordan (94) exercises with students during a NFL Play 60 Super School visit at Green Park Elementary in Metairie. Kids, a new report says, need a lot more time in physical activity and less time at the computer and looking at their smart phones. (Photo by Brett Duke, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune)

In short, the report, issued this week in Washington, says that young people spend too many hours locked in front of their computers, looking at their smart phones or watching TV. And not enough children exercise and fewer children walk or bike to school than previous generations of children. At least the authors don't claim they walked six miles, barefoot, to and from school every day.

According to the report card, only one quarter of America's 74 million children meet current physical activity guidelines of one hour of moderate to vigorous physical activity five days a week.

So what are parents supposed to do - save from exaggerating their own physical fitness activities in their youths? Dr. Peter Katzmarzyk, chair of the Report Card's research advisory committee and the Pennington's associate executive director, said parents just have to be a little more proactive.

Limit, when possible, Katzmarzyk suggests, your kids' time on the computer to two hours a day, though he concedes that sometimes homework assignments make that an impossible demand. He said the solution doesn't have to be an expensive gym membership, or getting them to try out for the soccer or basketball team.

Perhaps, parents should tell their kids "to go out and play, take a walk, or just throw the ball around, Katzmarzyk said.

Some of the report card's findings:

The percentage of children engaging in moderate to vigorous activity at least five days a week is 42 percent for 6-11 years old, but only eight percent for 12-15 years olds.

The percentage of young people engaging in the recommended two hours or less of "screen time" per day is 54 percent.

The percentage of children who regularly walk or bike to school is 13 percent. Apparently, that's much lower than decades ago when more kids attended neighborhood schools and bus and car pool options were more limited.

One number that was higher than some expected was the participation level for high school students in organized school or community sports teams. It was 64 percent for boys and 52.6 percent for girls.

The Pennington Biomedical's Kara Dentro, who wrote the report, said government needs to do a better job tracking physical activity, noting lax research, for instance, on sedentary behavior.

"Physical activity levels among children and youth in the U.S. are low, and sedentary behavior is high," Dentro said. "It's pretty clear that the current infrastructure, polices programs and investments in support of physical activity in children and youth aren't making the grade."

The report was put together by Pennington in collaboration with the National Physical Activity Plan and the American College of Sports Medicine.